Introversion Extroversion or Both in which I get my geek on

Before I launch into today's festival of nerdishness, I'd like to:

1. Thank all the individuals, past and present, who have served in the United States military, and on this day, remember and honor those who gave their lives in the service of this country. Amidst the barbeque and the giddiness over the beginning of the summer season, let's take some time to remember the reason this day is a holiday.
2. Thank each of you. Saturday was my six-month blogoversary, and since the end of last November, nearly 300 of you have become followers of this blog. I'm really touched by all your comments and participation, and I'll keep working hard to make The Strangest Situation worth your time.

NOW: Introversion vs. Extroversion.

On Friday, I asked you if you were one or the other or both. A significant majority of you (24 out of 37, or 65%), indicated you were introverts. Many of you used phrases like "100%" or "hands down", indicating you're quite definitely introverted. Several of you referenced your Myers-Briggs Type (I have GOT to do a post on that thing, and I will sometime this summer)--and they all started with "I".

Now, this shouldn't be surprising, right? Most of us are writers. And ... generally, writing is a pursuit that includes a lot of activity between the ears. Yes, to be good, you've got to get out of your own head and get others involved, but a lot of the process is solitary. In other words, we are NOT a randomly selected sample. If you polled individuals in the House of Representatives or actors on Broadway, you'd probably get a different result.

If any of you are wondering, yes, I am most definitely an introvert. When I was in college, I took Personality Psychology, and the professor handed out personality inventory results for the entire class (we'd all been assigned numbers, so no one was publicly outed or anything). But my number ... was on the extreme end of the continuum. According to that test, I was the most introverted person in that class of 40 people.

That doesn't mean I'm not socially skilled or don't enjoy being with other people. I do. I'm also quite a good public speaker, and I actually enjoy that kind of thing as long as I know what I'm talking about. However--I dislike parties and crowds. They wear me out quickly. I am easily overwhelmed by both the social expectations and the sensory stimulation. And in general, I am happiest when I have A LOT of alone time.

Many of you said very similar things. Quite a few of you were asking questions or stating you had tendencies toward both extraversion and introversion. In other words, you were saying you didn't fall neatly into either category. A lot of you were really trying to puzzle out "which one" you were--introvert or extrovert.

Now--if you are to believe a lot of these "personality type" tests, personality traits would be distributed like this:

This is a cute little bimodal distribution.

If this was the reality, most people fall into one category or another, and only a few people would fall in between. But is that the way things are?

No. Here's the way things are:

Personality traits like introversion-extroversion are normally distributed. MOST people fall somewhere in the middle (about 68%). In other words, if you randomly selected a hundred people from the general population and gave them a test that measured introversion-extroversion, only a few would come out as extremely introverted or extroverted.

Admittedly, if you take our little sample, our curve would probably look more like this:

This is an adorable positively skewed distribution.

As a group, we are probably more introverted than the general population. Even so, most of us will have scores that fall somewhere in between. We're not one or the other!

We're on a continuum.

 So! Don't feel bad if you couldn't figure out what type you are, or if you felt like you had qualities of both, or if you are an introvert in some situations/moods and not in others. I'm quite sure you're right. And if you think about this as a continuum, it might make it easier.

On Wednesday, I'll talk more about introversion-extroversion as it relates to social media.  But for today--does this make sense? Are you more comfortable thinking about introversion-extroversion (or any persoanlity trait) as a continuum rather than a category you have to fall into? Or do you feel more comfortable as a "type"?

Once upon a weekend my Internet ran away

This could quite possibly be the most frustrating, depressing and stressful weekend of my life. Ever.

It all started off on a cold and dark winters night...which has no relevance at all but really sets the scene doesn't it? I was watching Celebrity Big Brother's Big Mouth (CBBBM) on my laptop cos Dad decided to watch the ever so thrilling *yawn* darts on Sky; I watch TV shows on www.tvguide.co.uk It's very good but so effing slow. Anyway I was powering my way through the buffering when my internet decided to cut out. Great I thought, however this happens a lot to me and usually comes back on 30seconds later, but when it didn't, I could feel my heart beating louder and louder as my mind went through so many possibilities. Before I got carried away ('OMG WHAT IF ALIENS HAVE BROKEN THROUGH THE ATMOSPHERE AND CUT OFF ALL COMMUNICATION DEVICES'), I went to switch the internet box thing off and on again, which should work...it didn't. It was at this point I started writing my will before crawling under the duvet to listen to depressing songs.

Saturday morning I woke up forgetting last night's disaster and switched my laptop on as normal. I nearly fell of my chair when I saw 'Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage' and scurried downstairs to munch on a pain au chocolat to get my sugar levels up. By now I'd convinced myself that everything would be fine, it was just a little hiccup and it would be back to normal soon, so me and my Mum sat down to watch Eddie Izzard's DVD - which is HILARIOUS might I add. As the evening drew near my Mum phoned up the Orange people who are our Internet servers and ended up in a huge shouting match with them (they said we needed a new box thing and it wouldn't be here for 3-5 days, I'm sorry, but NO!) After speaking with the supervisor who said give it 48hours while they try and fix it, my Mum slammed the phone down and went to make herself a cuppa, leaving me standing in the middle of room for 20mins. literally, not knowing what to do with myself. I ended up on the floor in the foetal position clutching my phone and sobbing, seriously, for about half an hour listening to more depressing songs. Then I sorted out my wardrobe. That in itself explains my state of mind at this point.

I began to do my Physics coursework out of sheer boredom and losingitosity when I convinced myself we were being burgled, I even typed out 999 on my phone. The doorbell and my Mum went to answer it; my music was turned up loud but suddenly I heard a slam, a high pitched shout, mumbling, then silence. I'm sorry but who wouldn't think that was someone forcing their way into your home? My reaction was like a meerkat's. I sat up, turned the music off, grabbed my phone and steered my eyes towards my windows hatching an escape plan (which was already in my head, you know when you go through scenarios of 'What would I do if...'? Well this was one of those.) But my scenario was shattered when my brother ran up the stares asking if I wanted a bacon sandwich.

This dreadful day ended by texting Ronan and Max to keep me sane. Ronan said my internet had clearly run away with a distant relative to Yugoslavia and Max said I was missed and he couldn't find Lion King anywhere today. Yes that kept me sane.

Woke up Sunday miserable again, knowing full well this would be a day of no internet and therefore no life. I planned to sit in my pjs all day doing nothing but play Sims 2, when something flickered in my brain telling me to search for other wireless networks around. I gingerly pressed the refresh button on the wireless page, and one came up with no security. However much I tried to keep them down my hopes were having a sky high rave inside me as I double clicked. 'Connecting...CONNECTED.' My eyes zipped down to the little computer icon in the bottom right hand corner and the X had gone but the little blue circle over the computers still wasn't there. This moment was like a baby being born and everyone waiting for it to cry...my eyes were glued and time stood still as BAM! BLUE CIRCLE! I screamed, I jumped, I kissed the laptop screen as my mouse flew to the IE icon and tabs flew open to Twitter, YouTube, Hotmail, Facebook and 4OD...which is why my laptop then crashed...THE END.

NOT REALLY. Yes it crashed but I biffed myself round the head telling myself to stay calm this time. I checked each tab one by one, leaving 40D to the end. Then another kerfuffle happened. This internet connection was SOOOOOO slow, like old people shuffling in front of you in the high street. Big Mouth didn't work at first, it 'error occured' me, but then it did! But was slow too, the buffer thing took long then it decided to freeze every 5 seconds, literally. After 7 AND A HALF HOURS of watching Big Mouth it got to half way AND SHUT DOWN. Then it was my turn to freeze in horror. I almost slumped to the floor again when my brain again took over and diverted me to YouTube where I found it! THANK YOU SWEET BABY STEVIE B! But AGAIN it was slow and was freezing all the time. However finally the miracle happened when Davina eventually ran over to the reason I wanted to watch this so much, Paul Simper (@simperman)! FINALLY I SEE HIM MOVE AND TALK! The 10 seconds of chat were worth the stress then I closed it and went to munch on a biscuit. Nom.

So the moral of this story is ALWAYS BE PREPARED FOR THE WORST. It can surprise you at any moment and if it happens to any of you, I feel your pain. Now all I can do is wait for the new Orange Internet box, thing, to arrive. Until then, I'm stuck behind this Granny Internet. *Sigh* I love you all. X

P.S. By the way, @OfficialBB are doing a competition to win housemate's art from last week. You have to draw a housemate and email it to CBB. This is mine of Sov. Likey?